The effects of income and food safety perception on vegetable expenditure in the Tamale Metropolis, Ghana
Journal of Agribusiness in Developing and Emerging Economies
ISSN: 2044-0839
Article publication date: 25 June 2019
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine how consumers’ concern for food safety and income levels influence vegetable consumption patterns and expenditure in Tamale, Ghana.
Design/methodology/approach
Using data from a survey of 300 urban consumers, quantile regression analyses are used to examine how food safety consciousness, income and other factors influence vegetable expenditure across different quantiles.
Findings
Whereas protein-rich foods take smaller proportion, vegetables and cereals take more than half of the household food budget. Poor households spend greater proportion of income on food relative to wealthier households, although absolute amounts spent on food takes the opposite direction. Engel’s law applies to composite food expenditure and individual food classes. Bennett’s law applies to various food groups, with high-income households showing high dietary diversity than middle- and low-income households. Food safety consciousness and income groupings significantly influence vegetable expenditure at various quantiles. Expenditure of food safety conscious and high-income consumers are positioned on higher quantiles.
Research limitations/implications
The findings suggest a potential for agribusiness investors to develop safer vegetable niche markets in the study area.
Originality/value
The study is the first to analyze vegetable consumption in Ghana with a focus on food safety consciousness, income levels and consumers’ location.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
This work was conducted within the UrbanFoodPlus Project, funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) under the initiative GlobE – Research for the Global Food Supply, Grant No. 031A242-A,B. The authors would like to thank Professor Dr Wilhelm Loewenstein, Professor Dr Martina Shakya and Christina Seeger (Ruhr University Bochum), Sub-Project 7 of the UrbanFoodplus Project, for giving the authors the opportunity to be part of their survey on the elicitation of consumers’ willingness to pay for Certified foods in Tamale, Ghana. The authors are grateful for the chance to add the authors’ own questions related to income and food safety perception on vegetables to their questionnaire and for allowing the authors to use some of their socioeconomic data for the purpose of this paper.
Citation
Amfo, B., Ansah, I.G.K. and Donkoh, S.A. (2019), "The effects of income and food safety perception on vegetable expenditure in the Tamale Metropolis, Ghana", Journal of Agribusiness in Developing and Emerging Economies, Vol. 9 No. 3, pp. 276-293. https://doi.org/10.1108/JADEE-07-2018-0088
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2019, Emerald Publishing Limited